Economics is not my forte (but I am an expert on poverty) but this looks really bad:
The US government is on a ‘burning platform’ of unsustainable policies and practices with fiscal deficits, chronic healthcare underfunding, immigration and overseas military commitments threatening a crisis if action is not taken soon, the country’s top government inspector has warned.
David Walker, comptroller general of the US, issued the unusually downbeat assessment of his country’s future in a report that lays out what he called “chilling long-term simulations”.
These include “dramatic” tax rises, slashed government services and the large-scale dumping by foreign governments of holdings of US debt.
Drawing parallels with the end of the Roman empire, Mr Walker warned there were “striking similarities” between America’s current situation and the factors that brought down Rome, including “declining moral values and political civility at home, an over-confident and over-extended military in foreign lands and fiscal irresponsibility by the central government”.
“Sound familiar?” Mr Walker said. “In my view, it’s time to learn from history and take steps to ensure the American Republic is the first to stand the test of time.”
Mr Walker’s views carry weight because he is a non-partisan figure in charge of the Government Accountability Office, often described as the investigative arm of the US Congress.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/80fa0a2c-49ef-11dc-9ffe-0000779fd2ac.html
Shaun at Kiko's House has written one of the most heartbreaking pieces about the consequences of the war in Iraq. http://kikoshouse.blogspot.com/2007/07/happy-birthday-abeer-qassim-hamza.html#links . I won't exerpt, because it needs to be read in full.
A real, live presidential candidate said this:
“Freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.” the link
And even Opus, while funny, is depressing.http://www.comics.com/wash/opus/archive/opus-20070812.html
R.I.P. Phil Rizzuto.http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news?slug=txobitrizzuto&prov=st&type=lgns
1 comment:
"The US government is on a ‘burning platform’ of unsustainable policies and practices with fiscal deficits, chronic healthcare underfunding, immigration and overseas military commitments threatening a crisis if action is not taken soon, the country’s top government inspector has warned."
That's a pretty depressing litany. From where I'm standing, everything is looking much worse than it's being painted out in the mainstream. I try to create hope from the thought that when empires fall (and they always do) life always continues on a smaller, more human scale … and that's really how I want to live anyway. Howard Zinn says something to the effect of, "What's wrong with being number 2 or 3?"
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